Bhaktisandesam / Balance Your Emotions

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Hari-Om

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The Essentiality of Equanimity

 

 

Man in his pursuit of higher ambition is constantly juggling between

dichotomies - success and failure, attachment and aversion, hope and

despair, happiness and misery. Motivated by desire to succeed he

tosses himself into the storm of materialistic world. Success makes

him happy and it may lead to yet another vaulting desire, which

ultimately breeds greed in him. But, conversely, all his efforts may

amount to a colossal failure. Then the intense feeling of despair

leads to anger. No wonder, the Bhagavad Gita (16.21) names desire,

greed and anger, as " the three gates to hell " .

 

In his day-to-day struggle for existence man is led to confront these

dualities of life which narrows his perspectives to one of the two

limiting states: success or failure, happiness or misery etc., but

there could be a situation when the two are balanced. In such a

condition, one has neither the feeling of attachment with success and

the resulting feeling of hope, joy etc. nor that of aversion to

failure and the opposed feeling of despair, misery etc. That is the

state of equanimity in activities, speech or thoughts.

 

The concept of equanimity corresponds to " (dynamic) state of

equilibrium " used in physical sciences, when tendency for change in

opposed directions is nearly balanced. Also, in thermodynamics, if

the system in changing from one state to another the output of work

gets minimized if it is far from the equilibrium condition. Extending

the simile, state of equanimity is best suited for achieving optimum

success in any objective by an aspirant on the path of spirituality.

 

The Bhagavad Gita explains the principle of equanimity

thus: " Attachment and aversion by sense organs for respective objects

are natural; let no one come under their sway; they are his foes…

notions of heat and cold, of pain and pleasure have a beginning and

an end, are impermanent in nature…bear them patiently…be contented

with whatever comes without effort, remain unaffected by pairs of

opposites " . It also says that the serene minded person alone, to whom

dualities do not disturb, is easily set free from bondage of samsara

(world) and attain moksha (salvation).

 

This is precisely what Samuel Taylor Coleridge upholds in his

Biographia Literaria where he talks of the " reconciliation of

opposites " to reach a state of heightened sense perception or

imagination that creates sublime poetry. Even Abraham Lincoln had

emphasized the need of equanimity during the Civil War where the

outcome was uncertain: " Let us have faith that right makes might and

in that faith let us do our duty as we understand it " .

 

William Wordsworth, the romantic poet has said in Tintern Abbey that

when " the breath of this corporeal frame " and " the motion of our

human blood " are suspended,

 

" …we are laid asleep / In body, and become a living soul:

While with an eye made quiet by the power

Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,

We see into the life of things. "

 

Equanimity as a spiritual state can be gained by yoga or meditation.

A person who believes in Karma or duty may practice equanimity in his

karma with evenness of mind, nonchalant about the karma-phal or

outcome. A gyani or a wise person, pitches his wisdom in firmness

detached from all emotions. Such a " knower of self " is a samdarsi or

one who finds everyone equal, who envisions the supreme Self in all

beings and all beings in the Self. A dhyan yogi (one on the path of

meditation), for whom Supreme is the object of realization, holds

pleasures and pain in the same balance. For a bhakti yogi (one on the

path of devotion) equanimity is attained through his compassion

towards all and in his removing himself from all duality. Thus the

undeluded reach the eternal abode, the freedom from worldly bondage,

the nirvana.

 

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Jai Shree Krishna !